


modes of light

by mimesere



Series: temples made with hands [3]
Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Asexual Character, Disordered Eating, M/M, Post 174 and definitely not in line with 176, addiction withdrawal, but it is divergent from that, i mean it is in line with 176 in the sense that we all have a pretty good idea of what's coming, i really cannot express how much this is pure id-fic, zolf is an unreliable narrator of his own life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-19
Updated: 2020-11-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 00:07:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27624497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mimesere/pseuds/mimesere
Summary: Conversations with (formerly) dead people.
Relationships: Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde
Series: temples made with hands [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2008324
Comments: 49
Kudos: 44





	1. Great passions are for the great of soul

In love, as with so many other things, Zolf confounds Oscar’s expectations. If anyone had asked, and the only people who would are understandably distracted, Oscar would have said he expected an awkward but kind rejection, citing their previous and mutual disinterest in prioritizing anything over the increasingly desperate and unlikely success of all their work or Zolf’s general indifference toward the more physical expressions of passion or anything at all, really. There are a near infinite number of entirely justifiable reasons that Zolf could have used with all the painfully blunt honesty at his command to close the door on the possibility of them. Oscar had braced himself for it even as he’d tipped Zolf’s face up and kissed him, buoyed up by the joy of his returned magic and the unlooked for miracle of _not being dead_.

Instead, Oscar is given the gift of Zolf’s hand, squeezing his shoulder as Zolf passes by to snap his fingers at a scavenged barrel, filling it with water conjured through his hard-won and harder-tested faith. Oscar is given a smile, small and hesitant and precious, and knows it’s for him and he treasures the way that Zolf’s ears go red at the tips when Oscar smiles back. He’s given the pressure and warmth of Zolf’s body pressed against his side, where Zolf had, after a moment of deliberation, sat down firmly inside the boundary of space Oscar’s spent the last eighteen months claiming. 

A month or so ago, Oscar would have moved a necessary few inches away or brought up another plan, another lead, laying out ideas like traps. A week ago and Oscar would have stolen a moment to indulge in Zolf’s badly-hidden and exasperated fondness, giddy at finally doing something himself, at whole days and weeks of knowing himself and everyone safe and as far away from the fear of infection as it was possible to be. 

A day ago, Oscar was dead.

Now he’s learned that Zolf Smith approaches romance with all the directness he brings to everything else that matters and Oscar finds himself greedy for it, hoarding each deliberate affection like a dragon with their treasure, a Meritocrat with a domain made up of a singular, bloodyminded dwarf. 

“Did you know it was going to take him like that?” Zolf asks. He nudges at Wilde’s leg with his own and nods toward Barnes, who watches Carter’s antics with all the focus of a sheepdog with a reckless flock of one. He does not move his leg away after.

“I thought it likely,” Oscar says and takes Zolf’s hand in his own. “It worked on you at any rate, and you and Barnes aren’t dissimilar.”

“What?” Zolf’s indignance is a delight, as Oscar knew it would be. “We’re not--what?”

“You aren’t dissimilar,” Oscar says again and utterly fails to hide a smile. “You both like a clear goal and to be given your head in pursuit of it--”

Zolf scoffs. “That’s just _people_.”

Oscar leans in to Zolf, slouching down a bit to fit more comfortably against him. “My dear Mr. Smith,” he says and gets an elbow in his side for his obvious amusement, “your optimism as it regards people remains a wonder. People want to know what to do, either so they can do it or so they set themselves against it. They build the structures of their lives around the frames provided them and don’t think of it so long as they remain sheltered within.”

Truly, the body is a marvelous thing. Zolf’s skepticism is transmitted through the twitch of his fingers, still held in Oscar’s hands, and the huff of breath he lets out, the thrumming tension and subsequent relaxation of his muscles as he shrugs. Oscar cannot help but know these things, close as he is and as new as his own body is. 

It’s not unlike the first few moments of wearing a new suit, when one is aware of the movement of cloth over skin and the weight of layers or the slight constriction of a fitted waistcoat. Oscar is acutely aware of his own body in a way he hasn’t been since it failed him in Damascus. Grizzop’s brisk care -- and it was care, Oscar knows that, despite their regrettable lack of familiarity with each other -- had restored him to usefulness and Grizzop’s pressing need for Wilde’s help had been a stinging reminder that people relied on him. And after -- after he’d lost his best to Rome and been betrayed in the heart of the Meritocracy and read report after report of whole cities lost, after he’d realized just how awful things were getting -- when there was no time for elegance or artistry or beauty, it had seemed fitting enough a tribute to Sasha and Hamid and Azu and Grizzop that he continue on, functional and ready. He was a tool and one maintained one’s tools to the best of one’s ability.

One did not indulge in pleasure or excess when one was a tool. What use was hedonism when there were logistics to puzzle out and investigations to start and contacts to maintain? Function had been paramount and he’d fallen into it with the same dedication he’d once given to the pursuit of sunlit pleasure. 

Barnes had given him elegance back in the flash of a sword and neat footwork, in the orderliness of a sharp and logical mind. And in Carter, so unexpected a place, he’d found art again in rough landscapes and maps, drawn in a skilled and talented hand, in watching someone who was actually (however well hidden) a master of their own craft practice it (however impulsively). And Zolf had given him beauty back in books and cups of tea and bread, in the ferocity of his want for things to be better and the sharp edges of his sorrow. 

Here, now, he is aware of how warm Zolf is, the calluses on his hands from work and weaponry. The heat from the fire prickles at Oscar’s skin, chased by a shiver from the cold air. The ground is damp and cold, even through the waxed cloth Zolf had spread out before ushering Oscar onto it. He thinks he can smell the ghost of Zolf’s beard oil fighting with the cold crisp scent of snow and smoke winding its way up to the stars. 

“Neither of you likes to be idle,” Oscar says, picking up the thread he’d dropped in his distraction. “And you like it best when you’ve got someone to watch over.”

Zolf makes a displeased noise. “But Carter?”

“Carter would never have worked for you,” Oscar allows. “But he gives Barnes enough trouble to keep them both distracted.”

What Oscar doesn’t say is that he hadn’t given Zolf a person at all. He’d handed Zolf the whole world to worry over and Zolf had taken it and added their little band of misfits on top. 

Zolf turns his hand in Oscar’s until they’re palm to palm, lacing their fingers together. “You aren’t Carter.”

Oscar’s mouth goes dry and he wonders at how such a small gesture could disarm him so thoroughly. “No.”

“You aren’t trouble.”

“No?” Oscar tries for something light and is afraid he misses the mark. “I’m clearly not trying hard enough.”

“Wilde,” Zolf says impatiently. “Oscar.”

Oh dear. It’s been an age since anyone has said his name with that kind of warmth. “What am I to you?” It comes out so much more plaintive than Oscar wants.

Zolf takes a deep breath. “Someone I care about,” he says in a rush. “A lot.” He closes his eyes and mutters, “fuck,” under his breath. Oscar wants to laugh right up until Zolf looks at him and says, “I love you.”

Every word Oscar’s ever known flies right out of his head, as birds driven before some storm. He has a moment to think _but I knew this_ , and he had, probably before Zolf allowed himself to realize it. He’d known it in the way Zolf would reach out to grab his sleeve or lean against the edge of Oscar’s desk or hand Oscar one of his worn and obviously loved books when they were both rattling around the inn long before dawn, making a space for Oscar to occupy, every casual touch a sortie and invitation all at once. All that and it is somehow still a shock to hear it so unadorned, a whole world caught up in the simple lines and curves of every letter. 

“Right,” Oscar says. “I love you too. Of course.” And then, because he’d intended a great deal more for this moment, had reached for it between visits from Hamid and lessons in sailing an airship and found that Zolf defied poetry the way he defied gods, he adds, “I was going to write you a poem.”

“ _A poem_ ,” Zolf mutters, with all the bewilderment he can fit into the one word.


	2. the confraternity of the faithless

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> carter's opinions are his own.

“You could come down from there,” Barnes says reasonably. “Just--” and he makes a gesture that Howard thinks is supposed to be digging his claws into the tree trunk. 

Howard could come down that way. It’s how he got up into the higher branches of the tree. And it’s not like he’s ever had a problem with heights. Or depths. Or traps or cramped spaces or treacherous floors or trees. 

His hands are shaking. Are they considered paws now? He has a thumb - he taps the claw there one by one against the ones on his other fingers - is that the defining difference? He thinks Cel would know. Howard doesn’t think that Barnes can see him shaking from all the way down there. 

It’s cold is all. He’s high up and there’s nothing to break the wind and it’s cold. Howard is sluggish with it - are kobolds cold blooded? Another question for Cel - and is a little worried about how well he can climb when he feels thick and slow. 

“I’m fine!” he shouts. They make houses out of snow and ice, he’s heard. He’s not entirely sure how that could be warm but he’s definitely heard of it working. Magic? He has magic. Does he have enough snow? 

“Right,” says Barnes. “I’m coming up.” Howard squints down at him, dubious. He is very high up.

Howard watches Barnes gather up what he thinks he’ll need. Rope, mostly. Another two of the kobolds, Natun and Driaak, who put their heads together with Barnes for a little conference while Howard glares at them, feeling very much like a treed cat. Azu, trailing Kiko. An audience. Fantastic. 

Natun loops the rope around their arm and starts to climb. Howard seriously considers going higher but suspects that Natun would just come up after him. So he watches Natun clamber up easily and tie off the rope, the end dangling almost all the way down to where Barnes is waiting. 

Natun says something in Draconic and Howard shakes his head. They hiss out a sigh and sit down next to Howard, looping their tail around the branch. 

Howard beats down a moment of envy - his tail is nowhere near that flexible. “Hello.”

“You could climb down the rope,” Natun says. They’ve got markings around their snout that Howard hasn’t noticed before. Howard runs a hand over his own...snout? and wonders if he has the same. “Or your human can try climbing up here.”

Natun sounds skeptical enough of both things that Howard can feel himself bristling, but whether it’s on his own behalf or Barnes’ he doesn’t know. 

“He can make it up here,” Howard says, deciding to be sure of it. 

“Hmm,” is all Natun says to that. They sit there for another moment. “Do you want help?”

Even if Howard did, he wouldn’t say so. He shakes his head. 

And then Natun is gone again, ignoring the rope in favor of their own hands -- yes? hands, definitely that’s what they are -- and feet. They say something to Barnes, who is looking at the rope that doesn’t come down quite far enough for him to grab. Azu says something too, but they’re all too far away for Howard to hear so he watches instead.

Barnes waves the both of them off and what Howard can see of his face looks calm and intent. He takes a few steps back, then runs and jumps, catching the rope and swinging around until he can brace his feet up against the tree and half run, half climb up the silly thing. 

Howard waits until Barnes settles himself on the branch next to him, one arm wrapped up in the rope and holding on, but otherwise looking as comfortable as he would on the ground. “Show off,” Howard grumbles.

“Not looking at you though, were they?” Barnes asks, unwrapping the scarf from his neck and dropping it on Howard. 

The scarf’s not one of Barnes’ better efforts, uneven and fraying and Howard can see where he’d lost patience with it, tying off a knot at one end and not really bothering to neaten it. Not a one of Howard’s sisters would have let this out of their hands, much less used it. It’s warm though. There’s enough of it to cover all of him now.

“You’re ridiculous, you know that? What are you even doing up here?”

“You’re here,” Barnes says simply and Howard has the tiniest moment to feel some kind of way over it before he adds, “and you didn’t want to have a sensible conversation on the ground.”

“And we’re going to have a sensible conversation in a tree, are we?”

“Dunno about sensible. Or a conversation. We are in a tree, though,” says Barnes practically. 

Howard intends to say something about how Barnes is really irritating, but what comes out is, “I died!”

Barnes rubs his free hand over his face. “Yeah, I thought you were handling that too well.” 

Howard flails out and clutches at Barnes’ arm. “I died! I shouldn’t be here!”

“Did you not want to be here?”

“Well I don’t want to be dead,” Howard says. “Obviously!”

“Obviously.”

The stupidest thing is that this is actually an area that Howard’s an expert in. He’s studied death and how people deal with it and all things that go along with it. He can and has presented on it, laying out facts and conclusions convincing enough to get him funding to go looking for more. He had a reputation. It was even a good one.

Sure, he’s a thief. Every person in his profession is a thief, however much they paste it over with lofty ideas. Howard’s a thief _and_ a scholar. His job is to open doors and boxes, to put together the pieces he finds into some kind of meaningful whole. 

Mysteries are for the priesthood, for the Zolfs and Azus of the world to question and conduct. Howard has always preferred the facts, the things he can touch and hold and see with his eyes. 

Question: What’s the value of a life? 

Howard’s answer has always been that it’s whatever the living are willing to pay for it in time and money and ritual, all the bits and pieces they put together to buffer themselves from the inevitability of the dead.

“Did anyone...” he asks and hates that he doesn’t know how to finish that question. Care? Too sentimental. Honor him? And why would they? Wrap him in a sheet and call it done? Likely. 

“Azu tried to heal you,” says Barnes when Howard doesn’t finish. He’s always been like that, leaping over the gaps Howard leaves behind. “She carried you back. Zolf cleaned you up. I found you some clothes.”

Time, at least. It’s not nothing.

They lapse into silence. It’s awfully cold and Howard shuffles closer, trying to find some angle where he can be warm and use Barnes as a wind block. It’s almost a shock when Barnes breaks the quiet to say, “I found your cache.” 

“A cache,” Howard corrects, because there’s no way he found them all. 

“I took some of the coins for you and Wilde. Brought it all to Zolf and we laid you out.” It has the tone of a confession, hushed and a little embarrassed in a way that Barnes usually isn’t. 

“I didn’t think you believed in all that.”

That lack of faith was one of the funnier things about Barnes, who limits his concern to the things he can influence and puts everything else in a box marked "someone else's problem." He does it with Zolf even, more concerned with the practicalities of what Zolf can do than with all the questions he raises. It's lucky for all of them probably that Zolf does the same thing.

“I don’t. No reason not to make sure, though.” Barnes looks down at Howard and neatens the scarf around him, pulling it up and over his head. He clears his throat. “And, to be clear about all this, I stole your money. I thought you’d like that better.”

Howard does, actually. “What, all of it?” 

“Enough of it to see you sent off right,” says Barnes. 

Time and money and ritual, then. The vague, panicky feeling that’s been bubbling around under Howard’s skin subsides. 

“You should have stolen all of it.” Barnes looks so offended at the idea that Howard barks out a laugh. “Would it be better if I wrote it down? To James Barnes, I deed all my worldly possessions if he can find them. No stealing required.”

“Keep your things,” says Barnes. “What would I do with ten bottles of wine and a pack of thieving tools?”

“Buy your little house,” says Howard, who does pay attention to things. “Buy yourself a boat. Woo some bright young thing into sharing it with you. They’re very expensive bottles of wine.” And jewels. And money. He thinks about leaving behind a list -- no, too incriminating -- a map, then, something for Barnes to chase down when he gets bored with quiet retirement. Maybe with some nonsense about returning goods. He’d like that. 

Barnes rolls his eyes and the familiarity of it all goes a long way toward steadying Howard. “Are you ready to go? It’s cold up here.”

“Fine,” says Howard. “Help me down?”

Barnes smiles at him and Howard pretends not to notice. “Yeah all right.”


	3. the strangely simple economy of the world

Sassraa gets about a minute after they and Cel convince Natun and Driaak that they’ll be _fine_ , just go help already, before Captain Earhart is clearing her throat and waiting just outside the improvised cloth cave that the others set up. 

Seeing Earhart is a reminder that things could be worse. At least this body doesn’t ache.

“Oh! Captain--” Cel glances between Sassraa and Earhart and back, doing something with their eyebrows that Sassraa thinks might be trying to say something. “Hey. Hello.” They grimace and drop their eyes and Sassraa thinks, no, wrong, Earhart doesn’t want that--

The frown on Earhart’s mouth eases and Sassraa remembers the easy way they’d fallen into it while in Earhart’s body and yes, there, the way that everything felt tight around their eyes. “Mx. Sidebottom.” She sounds scratchy and hoarse, like she’s been awake for hours. Sassraa knows. Earhart nods at Cel and then focuses on Sassraa again.

“Captain,” Sassraa says carefully. It rumbles out anyway, lower and heavier than Sassraa’s used to. Behind her, a wing twitches. It catches Earhart’s eyes and her face goes still, her hand clenching on the butt of her pistol. Her eyes flick up to the tops of Sassraa’s new and unwieldy wings and down, over all the extra length of them in the arms and body and legs and tail. Sassraa doesn’t feel stretched out, everything feels right and theirs and correct. This is their body. And even so, Sassraa remembers being able to look Earhart in the eyes without trying,when Earhart was in her own body and when she was in Tadyka’s. It makes them dizzy if they think about it too long.

Earhart presses her lips together and shakes her head, dragging her eyes away from the wings and back to Sassraa’s face. “Sassraa,” she says and stops. She takes a deep breath. Sassraa remembers doing that too, filling in the angry, empty ache in their--her?--Earhart’s body with as much air as they could pull in. When she speaks again, her voice is firm. “I wanted to let you know that as long as I have a ship, you have a place on it. Assuming, of course, we can get the Vengeance up and in the air again.”

Cel tenses beside them and says, “I can go--

“Sit down, Cel,” Earhart says, waving a hand. “Tomorrow’s soon enough. My offer stands for you, too.”

“Thank you?” Cel says. 

The frown is back on Earhart’s face. Sassraa wonders how much she’s hurting. Earhart starts to edge back. “You’ve both been--you’re very good at your jobs. I’d be a bad captain if I didn’t try to keep you.” She nods at the both of them and lets the flap of cloth acting as a door fall between them. 

“That was strange,” says Cel. Their Draconic is getting much better. “Not as strange as everything else, but pretty high on a normally calibrated scale.”

Sassraa pulls their legs up, wrapping their arms around their knees like they’ve seen Cel do. There’s just so much of them now and they don’t know how they fit anymore. “She apologized to me before we switched back.”

Cel mimics Sassraa’s position, folding in on themselves in a way Sassraa can’t match, not with the wings that don’t entirely obey them and the tail that’s so much longer. They coil it around and around, propping themselves up. At least they’ve still got that. “She was awful to all of you,” Cel says carefully.

That hadn’t been it, really, even though Earhart had apologized for that too. That had been a stiff, quick apology that looked like embarrassment on Tadyka’s body, tail whipping back and forth and hands clenching, all the agitated acknowledgment of a child caught out doing something foolish. 

The other one, though. 

_Earhart looked away from Sassraa, that was the first thing. She looked at the walls and the floor and only stolen quick glances at Sassraa, pale and sweat damp in Earhart’s body. She looked at the half eaten plate of food on the desk and at where Sassraa was holding on to the edges of the chair hard enough to make their hands ache._

_She nodded at the food. “You should eat. Mr. Smith is a decent enough cook and it will help.”_

_“It tastes strange,” Sassraa said. Mostly it tasted like nothing at all, just an unappealing set of textures in their mouth._

_Earhart made a small noise that Sassraa thought might have been agreement. “It--I think that’s just me,” she said. She picked up the chunk of bread that Sassraa had left alone and tore off a small piece, holding it out. “My body, I mean.”_

_Sassraa took the bread and sighed deeply. Bread was fine, they supposed. They chewed it carefully and swallowed, then took the cup of water Earhart handed them. “I know how to eat.” They were careful to keep their tone even. Skraak had said to handle Earhart carefully. Like one of the animals they’d said and they’d meant the kind the guards used to turn over to the scientists, Shoin’s assistants before they’d all run or been run off, who’d tried everything from new formulas to new limbs on the feral little things until they’d handed them over to the kobolds for disposal._

_“Yeah, I’m sure,” Earhart said, tearing off another piece of bread and handing it over. “I used to love it. Thought there was nothing better in the world than good food and a good drink and open skies. I still think that.”_

_Sassraa held onto the bread but made no move to eat it._

_Earhart set the rest of it back onto the plate and looked away again. “I’m sorry you’re in there. I was...I’m sorry. It hurts and there’s not a lot of anything that makes that better. Mr. Smith can and will insist on helping if you tell him. Tell him. I will make that an order if I have to.”_

_Sassraa tilted their head. “You don’t like us,” they pointed out. Earhart wasn’t subtle about it. “What does it matter if it hurts me?”_

_Earhart drew herself up. Sassraa thought it might have looked different on her own body, but in Tadyka’s it just looked like she wanted a fight. “You are a member of my crew. I have an obligation to make sure you are treated fairly and have everything you need to do your job. If I can’t do that, I shouldn’t have let you on board. You, in there? That’s not fair to you and that is no one’s fault but mine.”_

_Sassraa popped the piece of bread into their mouth and chewed thoughtfully. The tip of Tadyka’s tail twitched; that happened when Tadyka was feeling impatient. Sassraa wondered if that was true even when Tadyka wasn’t in there. “You didn’t put me in here.”_

_“The condition of that body is--”_

_Sassraa interrupted. “You should be in here.”_

_“Yes,” Earhart said. She shifted her weight on to her back foot like she wanted to run. Skraak did that too when they didn’t like what Sassraa was saying. “I did that to myself. No one else should have to deal with it.”_

_In Sassraa’s experience, people doing stupid things didn’t like Sassraa pointing that out. It was nice to see that that held true. They waited._

_“Tell Mr Smith,” Earhart said. She still looked like she wanted a fight. “Please,” she added on like it pained her and all the tension ran out of her all at once. She slumped and rubbed at a spot on Tadyka’s head that matched a place where Sassraa could feel things getting tight and painful in this body’s -- in Earhart’s head._

_Sassraa nodded. They could be gracious. And they wanted to lie down again. “All right.”_

_Earhart started to leave and then stopped, turning to look Sassraa over. Sassraa sighed. “I’ll just send Mr. Smith along now,” said Earhart. “You look terrible.”_

_“You look terrible,” Sassraa grumbled._

_“That is what I just said.”_

“She’s a mess,” says Cel. “I know messes - I am one! Very often, both in the, ah, actual sense where I have chemicals, usually, reagents? Sometimes tea. A lot of times tea. And and solvents. Those get everywhere. But also in the less actually physical sense and more the--” Cel gestures at the pseudo-door Earhart just left. “Like that.”

“Everyone is,” Sassraa says philosophically. It’s what makes them interesting, at least. Sassraa can’t imagine what someone with a neat soul would even be like. Awful, probably. Boring.

Cel reaches out, laying a hand on Sassraa’s arm and Sassraa does not draw their wings down around them to hide, but it’s a close thing. Cel’s hand is chilly and, true to form, they’ve got a burn on one finger from where they’d been careless while welding and scars everywhere, scattered across Cel’s knuckles and the back of their hand, climbing up their arms, all the evidence of a messy, very interesting life. 

Sassraa’s got nothing to show for themselves. Of all the things that have happened, that feels the worst. They spread out their hands and they’re blank of anything that shows what Sassraa’s survived.

“You could come back with me, too,” Cel says. “I have a workshop in Japan. I would be--I would like it very much if you wanted to come there when this is all over. Or, or, we could travel. See what else we can find.”

“Like this?” Sassraa asks. One of their wings flexes and stirs up a breeze.

Cel looks them over. “I think you look nice. I thought you looked nice before too. And I think those wings look functional? And flying is such--I’ve heard it’s very fun. We could try it.”

“Skraak can glide.”

“Hamid can fly, but it’s magic and not wings.” Cel leans in close, lowering their voice. “Just between the two of us, I think that might be cheating.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trufax: I rolled a 100 on a d100 which is dealer's choice in terms of the reincarnate table. So Sassraa gets to be a wyvaran, which is basically a human sized kobold with bonus wings.


	4. channels for the transmission

There’s something that feels very wrong with being bigger than Skraak. 

Not that Skraak seems to notice at all that they’re looking up at Meerk. Mostly they just look worried and a little angry, like they’ve done since everyone woke up at the Institute. 

“I’m _fine_ ,” Meerk says. This is a lie.

It is mostly a lie.

Meerk will be fine. And as long as there’s a will be, Meerk counts it for themself as a thing achieved. They will be fine and so they are fine, because Skraak won’t let them not be.

“I’m getting Zolf,” Skraak says and they’re gone before Meerk can tell them again that they don’t need healing. 

Tadyka snorts next to Meerk. 

“They’re trying,” Meerk says reproachfully. Skraak tries very hard. It’s not their fault that everything’s gotten very weird and bigger than anyone was expecting. 

“You don’t need a healer,” Tadyka points out. “You said so.”

Yes, all right, Meerk did say so. They don’t need a healer, they don’t think, but they don’t actually know because their body is new and they don’t know what everyone else felt or what normal is anymore. Maybe this body is just too big? How do humans work, anyway?

Hamid bursts in a few moments later. The smell of cold-snow-smoke is more muted and Hamid much brighter. Differently brighter? They look at Tadyka, who looks mostly normal. “Meerk?” he asks. 

“Hello,” Meerk says and waves. 

“Skraak is--” and Hamid stops abruptly, looking at Meerk’s face closely. “Oh. That’s...going to take getting used to.”

Meerk reaches up and checks their face. They have all the bits and pieces. Nothing feels wrong. “What?”

“You look--” Hamid shakes his head and produces a mirror from somewhere. It’s small and feels fragile in Meerk’s hands and when they look at themselves, they see a normal human face looking back. It looks vaguely familiar, but Meerk’s seen a lot of humans in their time. “You were in Barnes’ body after the wild magic, yes?”

Meerk shrugs. That sounds right, but aside from learning that the body they were in could move properly, if heavily, they hadn’t really cared much whose body it was. It doesn’t matter though, because Skraak comes back in, followed by Zolf, who is followed by someone Meerk doesn’t know. 

Zolf makes a surprised face but doesn’t slow down at all. “Hey, Meerk.” His voice is rough but sounds warmer than Meerk thinks they’ve ever heard it. He holds out his hand and Meerk surrenders one of theirs to it. “It’s good to see you.”

“Hamid says I look funny,” Meerk says and waits to see what anyone else does with that.

“I didn’t say _funny_!” Hamid’s voice goes up in a really interesting way when he says that and he starts talking faster, glancing between Skraak and Zolf and Meerk. “I said it would take getting used to!”

“Oh Hamid,” sighs the other one. “It will take getting used to? Really?”

There’s something familiar in that cadence and tone that pricks at Meerk’s ear. If they close their eyes and listen--

“Shut up, the both of you,” Zolf says and a wash of--of--it’s not magic exactly. And it’s not _not_ magic. It’s a third thing that feels like when Skraak had agreed to take them on this trip or when they’d woken up right in the first time in ages or when they’d gone to sleep somewhere proper, tucked away in place they’d found that was all theirs. 

The other one starts humming something and Zolf glares at them but doesn’t stop them. There’s something under the song that Meerk can almost hear. They do close their eyes then and listen. Zolf’s voice drops away and Skraak’s and Hamid’s after them. Trying to pull apart what’s happening with the song is like trying to see the wavery bit above where it’s hot. They keep dropping it and finding it again and Meerk almost has it when the other human stops. 

Meerk opens their eyes. The one who came with Zolf is looking at them sharply. Zolf’s frowning -- usual, normal -- and Hamid is next to Skraak and the two of them are watching Meerk too, but with worry and not interest. Tadyka’s tucked themself away behind Meerk; their scales are cool against Meerk’s back. They lean against each other and it makes Meerk feel better. 

“Right, I can fix this,” Zolf says. He squeezes Meerk’s hand and mutters something in a different language, not one of the ones Meerk knows. It feels like Meerk’s dropped down into a brisk, cold pool and come out again somewhere hot. They’re not tired anymore and the dizziness is gone. “That should hold you over until I can figure out something permanent.”

Meerk nods then points at the human who’d come with Zolf. “What did you do?”

“Just a bit of a boost,” they say, waving a hand. They’re smiling though, pleased with themselves. “You could feel it?”

“Just a bit of showing off,” Zolf says at the same time. 

Meerk ignores him. “How do I do that?”

Hamid’s eyes go wide and he looks between Meerk and the new person. “You have your magic back! Wilde, that’s fantastic. I’m so happy for you!”

Wilde tilts his head at Hamid and smiles a little, but they don’t stop looking at Meerk. “I can teach you, if you like. As much as I can.”

Meerk looks at Skraak, who sighs but nods. Meerk doesn’t have a tail anymore, but if he did, they think it would be curling and uncurling, restless in excitement at something new to learn. They try a smile instead and it feels right. It feels very much like everything is going to be fine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bards! lesser restoration! dealing with the effects of negative levels and con drain! i tried to work in some stuff about hamid's eyeliner and failed utterly because I don't think that Meerk would have noticed, but know that in my heart, Hamid's been a little lax on the prestidigitation for his makeup.


	5. who can calculate the orbit of his own soul?

Doubt creeps in while Wilde sleeps. Not about him; for all his flash and deflection, Wilde is solid all the way through, the kind of foundation that’ll support anything Zolf would want to build. An inn, a hospital, a fortress where Zolf can keep (almost) everyone he cares about safe and healthy behind sturdy walls. A home.

Zolf, though. There is a crack right through the center of him. A fault that widens every time he loses someone or fails or runs away, sometimes all three at once, and he doesn’t know how deep it goes or where it will break him apart completely. 

Wilde’s head is heavy on Zolf’s shoulder and his body is loose and sleepwarm where it’s pressed against Zolf’s chest. He’s going to wake up hurting all over the way he’s contorted himself to fit into the dubious shelter of Zolf’s body, but Zolf can’t bring himself to move him. Selfish, he thinks. 

“You’re thinking very loudly,” Wilde murmurs. He turns his head, nosing at the spot between Zolf’s jaw and his ear and letting out a pleased little hum. His breath feathering across the skin there sends a shudder down Zolf’s spine, a tangle of sensation that makes Zolf want to hunch his shoulders up at the shocking intimacy of it or squirm away from the tickle or tilt his head to give Wilde more room, to let them both chase the sharp-too much feeling into where it settles into something Zolf understands and can build on, layer by slow layer. 

Caught between warring impulses, Zolf freezes and does none of them. Wilde doesn’t move again and Zolf relaxes a little, stroking a hand along Wilde’s side. “You need to sleep,” he says. He pulls Wilde a little closer and makes himself relax the rest of the way. 

He’s half convinced himself that Wilde’s fallen asleep again when Wilde says, quietly, carefully, “This is enough for me. With you.”

Zolf remembers what Wilde had called their private literary salon, him and Barnes and Zolf trading around whatever novels and booklets they’d brought with them, Zolf’s Campbells and Wilde’s poetry and dramas and Barnes’ battered collection of American dime novels. They’d argued over everything. Carter had joined forces with Wilde to defend, with what Wilde later called a surprising degree of eloquence, Wilde’s collection of poets against Barnes and Zolf’s shared opinion that they could just get to the point already; Barnes had thought Jennifer’s choices to be the right ones and had been shouted down by Zolf and Wilde; Zolf hadn’t understood a single decision anyone had made when they’d gone through Romeo and Juliet, though he’d reserved his most scathing commentary for the cleric of Aphrodite who should, in Zolf’s opinion, absolutely have known better.

(“With that many terrible decisions, he should have been a cleric of Zeus,” Zolf had muttered at the end of it all. 

Wilde had laughed then and asked, “What would you have done?”

“Dunno. Nothing with the Poseidon lot. Not a lot of weddings to officiate with them. Now?” Zolf had shrugged. “Married them, sent them somewhere with some money, and told both sides to sod off if they came around looking.”

“Such romance!”

“I’d’ve tried talking them out of it first,” Zolf added and felt some of his irritation lighten at Wilde’s mirth.)

He wonders how much of himself he’d given away those nights, what he’d said that had exposed the cool, slow kindling heart of himself. 

The idea of Wilde _settling_ is like the tip of a chisel set carefully into the crack in Zolf’s soul. 

“It’s not for me,” Zolf says after a moment. He wants to know the texture of Wilde’s skin beneath his fingers and the way that his muscles move under his skin. He wants to touch Wilde without telling himself to do it, without having to think about it at all, to reach out and know the shape of Wilde’s body the way he knows the haft of his glaive or the feel of his own magic. 

He wants Wilde in ways that make him feel raw and uncomfortable, whole structures of understanding himself swept away in the flood of shock and grief and hope. 

Zolf is a cleric of a concept he can barely put words to, but he’s always been able to find it in the doing, in the works of his hands. Healing and fighting and cooking and holding on. He wants to know Wilde that way: through the rush of Zolf’s magic through him, learning all the parts of him that Zolf hopes never to see again; and he wants fight with and beside Wilde, preferably in front of him where Zolf can stand between him and a threat; Zolf wants to try his hand at whatever the most ridiculous dish Wilde’s ever had just to see if he can do it better; Zolf wants one person — this one person — to stay, to hold on to Zolf the way Zolf keeps failing to hold on to others. 

It had been fine when he hadn’t thought about it. Now it’s just a mess of “is this too much?” and “is this enough?” and the horrible lingering feel of a coin in his fingers, pressed against the strange coldness of Wilde’s lips. 

“I don’t know how to do this,” Zolf says when Wilde seems happy enough to let the silence sit. He drags the words up out of his chest and they’re awful, he hates them for being proof of his doubts and worries when what he wants is to be here, now, enjoying a moment he’d thought of and put away as not bloody likely. “Not when it’s--not when it’s like this. The rest of it is all bodies, yeah? Sex and healing and killing, it’s all just knowing how the body works and doing it. I know how to do all that.”

He can’t stop himself from covering where the worst of the torn open bits had been on Wilde’s chest. Zolf knows to a nicety how much a human body can take and Wilde had been well past it. The skin under Zolf’s hand is smooth and unmarked. New. Like nothing had even happened. 

Zolf wonders if he could have survived it if he’d gone over instead. Maybe. Better odds on it anyway.

“Everyone wants someone who’s not off thinking about something else or...or busy doing something or looking for the next problem to fix.” None of it is coming out right. “I don’t know how to _stay._ ”

Zolf’s left his family and his ship and his crew and his team and his god. He’d have left Wilde behind if there hadn’t been a convenient miracle at hand. Give him a reason and Zolf will find a way to open that door and walk away every time.

Wilde makes a low, thoughtful sound. “It does seem that I was wrong about you.”

Zolf closes his eyes. Wilde’s going to have to be the one to move away. Zolf doesn’t have it in him to let go first. “Yeah. Most people are.”

Wilde uncurls a bit, stretching out his legs where they’re slung over Zolf’s and sitting up until his mouth is light against the scar on Zolf’s temple. “You are possibly the most dramatic person I’ve ever met.”

“What?”

“Do you even listen to yourself?” Wilde scoffs and Zolf thinks about taking offense when he says, “You want a problem to fix? I’ll find you a dozen and we’ll sort them by impact or population or weather for a nice holiday. You think you’re going to leave? Our world ended and you couldn’t get rid of me. I died and here we are. You don’t know how to stay? What nonsense.”

“Wilde--”

“No.”

Zolf sighs. “Oscar.”

Oscar sits up finally and Zolf lets his hands fall away as the cold air wraps around the two of them. He snaps his fingers and conjures a light between them. It’s dim, just enough for Oscar to see at all and enough to shade everything in a soft, muted version of itself for Zolf. Oscar leans forward and in this strange little twilight he’s made, he almost looks like himself again, or at least the version of himself that Zolf remembers from London and Paris. 

“It’s not nonsense,” Zolf says. “It’s the simple truth.”

“The truth is never simple.” Oscar cradles Zolf’s face in his hands and it’s so much like earlier, that Zolf half expects a kiss. Instead, Oscar rests his forehead against Zolf’s and they breathe together for a moment. “Did it never occur to you that we could go together?”


End file.
